Inspirations for Intentional Sociology

The first thing that happened was that I was intrigued by the idea of “committing sociology,” first mentioned in April of 2013 by the prime minister of Canada a terrorist attack on a Canadian train. PM Harper argued that now was not the time to commit sociology — meaning, I suppose, not a time to think about structural reasons for violence, inequality — , which you can read about here.

A follow-up talk suggested that it was, in fact, just a fine time to commit sociology.

The second thing was that after two commune members gave a remarkable talk in my Sociology of the Family course, I started thinking about a sabbatical project related to looking at an intentional community called Twin Oaks in Louisa, VA.

Since committing sociology sounds accidental, while intentional sociology sounds … well… INTENTIONAL, I went from there.